Monument begins tour at Scopes Trial courthouse

DAYTON, Tenn. | The Ten Commandments monument banished from Alabama's state judicial building started a tour Saturday in a town that put the teaching of evolution on trial almost 80 years ago.

"The ACLU is still the enemy," said June Griffin of Dayton, a perennial political candidate and outspoken advocate for displays of the Ten Commandments in public schools and government buildings.

About 75 people, many with cameras, stood along a tree-shaded sidewalk outside the Scopes Trial courthouse in Rhea County to see the 5,280-pound granite monument displayed on a flatbed truck Saturday. Many stepped up a ladder to take photos and pose beside the marker.

Roy Moore lost his job as Alabama's chief justice for defying a federal court order to remove his display from the lobby of the judicial building in Montgomery, Ala.

Moore approved the tour but is not participating. A spokeswoman said he plans to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to reverse the ruling that it was an unconstitutional government promotion of religion.

"I think it was awful for them to make them move it from the courthouse," Sneed said. "That is what our country is based on, is God and the Bible. Why we want to take God out I don't know. I think we are headed for big trouble when we take God out of schools and everything."

Larry Darby, president of the Montgomery-based Atheist Law Center, Inc., was heckled by some in the crowd and loudly told, "You're not welcome here."

At one point, John Rocco, 73, of Dayton, bumped his knee into Darby's leg as they passed on the ramp steps to the display.

"I'm glad I didn't carry my gun. I'd probably be in jail right now." Rocco said. "I believe in the Ten Commandments and I don't appreciate what people like him are doing to my country."

Griffin said the courthouse stop and rally that also attracted about 75 people at the Rhea County High School football were the first of almost a dozen stops for the monument in Tennessee through Aug. 8.

The Rhea County Courthouse became a flashpoint for creationism vs. evolution in 1925 at Dayton, about 35 miles northwest of Chattanooga. At the trial, orator and presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan and lawyer Clarence Darrow squared off during the prosecution of Scopes for teaching evolution instead of the biblical story of creation.

The county schools also had Bible classes for 51 years until they were stopped in 2002 by a federal lawsuit.

Dayton and Dunlap were first-day stops on the tour arranged by American Veterans In Domestic Defense, a Texas-based veterans' group looking for congressional support to permanently display the marker at the U.S. Capitol.

The monument was placed in a judicial building closet for almost a year until Moore accepted the offer by the veterans' group to take it on the road. The group promotes itself as veterans dedicated to battling domestic enemies and protecting "Christian heritage."

"One of our domestic enemies is our failing judicial system," said Jim Cabaniss, president of the group's American Veterans Standing for God and Country project. "Our position is we have removed the monument from a dark room in the Alabama Supreme Court Building and exposed it to the world."

Cabaniss said the tour, which could continue for up to a year, is not political and is not raising money for the group or Moore.

While declining to comment about the turnout at the events at Dayton, Cabaniss said "it matters. As more people hear about it we hope it will grow."

No speakers asked for contributions but pamphlets handed out at the stadium rally included an application for active membership in the veteran's group, at a cost of $120 a year or $1,000 for lifetime. A representatives of the Foundation for Moral Law, Inc., of Montgomery sold Ten Commandments pins for $5.

Cabaniss said the tour would probably go to Mississippi from Tennessee. Cabaniss said the monument would be taken to Washington on Oct. 22 for an "America For Jesus" rally.